susan.howai's photostream

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The Magic of the Nutcracker!

The Nutcracker and Clock (Front)

The Nutcracker, Tchaikovsky's two-act ballet was first performed in St. Petersburg, Russia in December of 1892.  It was not a raving success. However, the twenty-two minute suite was, and so, inspired by this great music, Graphic45 paper and Arlene (designer at Graphic45) I spent the last two days making these Christmas tree ornaments, having the best time and I'm not done yet!

The chipboard piece of the Nutcracker is taken from Nutcracker Sweet Tags 1 is attached to a Tim Holtz Metal Holder and hot glued to a round paper-mache ornament that was first painted with white Golden Acrylic paint, embellished with lace and faced with Graphic45 paper.  The score sheet, Nutcracker Sweet Collection, Enchanted Journey, was added and the ends were curled using a skewer.

Grand-daughter's (Front)

Each ornament measures 3.75 inches and hangs from a string of small white pearls.  The ballerinas were all fussy cut and attached to the background with Pop-dots.  Mulberry roses in blue, soft pink, white and lavender sparkle with Stickles, Icicle and ornate keys complete the tree hanger. On the back of my grand-daughter's there is a pink rose, chipboard tag from Nutcracker Sweet Tags 1 and a metal swirl.

Grand-daughter's (Back)

Sugar Plum Fairy (Front)

Sugar Plum Fairy (Back)

The Sugar Plum Fairy and the Blue Ballerians are both made using tags and paper from the Nutcracker Sweet Collection. Stay tuned as there are five blanks on my studio table waiting to be completed and a couple of these will be sent to my Esty store...SilkRoadFabricArts.

Blue Ballerinas (Front)

Blue Ballerians (Back)

The Nutcracker and Clock (Back)

Enjoy!

Embroidered Cave Walls

Caves are fascinating places. They are places of history, intrigue, mystery and art.  In my imagination my cave walls are covered with drawings, in some places flowers grow and in the distance you can hear water falling. 

In the distant past, the water carved out channels and if you follow those channels to its source, what will you find? Broken pieces of pottery, perhaps more drawings, stone tools, caves are never dull places. These five needle felted, machine quilted, fabric art postcards reflect my love of caves.  I took some liberty when creating these "walls" as they are made of wool and silk rovings in colors of purple and plum, pinks, soft blues, rich indigo and wild reds. There are lots of wild flowers, french knots of multicolored threads, piled one on top the other and running along deeply carved water courses. Vines of fly stitches made of variegated pearl cotton cling to lightly shimmering "walls", seed beads, metal findings are strewn across the cave "floor" and circular drawings of rayon threads abound.  Some drawings have been worn away by time but most are visible and very colorful.  Is that a trilobite?

Detail of Cave Wall

Five Needle Felted Fabric Art Postcards

Enjoy!

Greetings,
I know it's been a while, but the foreclosure crisis here in south Florida is taking an enormous toll on families and so I have been assisting members of my community adjust to the difficult times, working with the homeless, etc. and those efforts are taking me away from the Studio.  Nevertheless, I am Trinidadian and so when I was asked to do these masks, as much as I tried to say no, I could not resist.  As you can see the limited palette of black, silver and dark red is quite dramatic.  The feathers are held by an antique brooch and the swirls are Swarovski flat back AB crystals.

Enjoy!

All for Love

"For this was on seynt Volantynys day

Whan euery bryd comyth there to chese his make." 

"For this was Saint Valentine's Day, when every bird cometh there to choose his mate."

Geoffrey Chaucer, Parlement of Foules (1382)

These words, written by the English poet Geoffrey Chaucer in the closing years of the fourteenth century, are thought to be the first noted association of romantic, courtly love with February 14, St. Valentine's Day.  In those days ladies did needlework and a few knew how to write.  Ink, parchment and wax was expensive but we've come a long way baby!
Although quite a few of us know how to thread a needle and many of us know how to write we have not been able to merge the two, until now.

I love making fabric art postcards.  These are done in the style of crazy quilts, hand embroidered on a crazy patch of silk/cotton fabric combination, silk and antique, hand-dyed lace.  I have used hand-dyed pearl cotton and rayon threads for the stitching, Swarovski crystals, beads and found objects.  The cards can be written on (see back of card) using a gel pen or Sharpie.

Back of card

Pick one or two up today from my Etsy store at: http://www.etsy.com/shop/SilkRoadFabricArts and send to someone you know who loves both needlework and hand written notes and who doesn't these

days!

Enjoy!

In the Year of the Water Dragon

Happy Chinese New Year 

May good fortune greet you at every turn.

Peace and Great Happiness!

Spun Sugar

The months from November to April carry with them what my husband calls "statistically perfect days." I had one such day earlier this week.  There was no humidity, a gentle breeze blew across the lake and a mild 75 degrees lured me onto the back deck with squirt bottles of dye, five yards of white PFD fabric and lace soaking in a bucket of soda ash.  I strung a laundry line from the fence and hung the first yard of fabric across it.  Dyeing fabric is part science (I use PRO Chemical & Dye fiber reactive dyes), art and magic.   The color combinations of magenta, golden yellow, raspberry, emerald green, turquoise, baby blue, lemon yellow and amethyst are but just a few of the colors I used that day. It took most of the morning to get all the dyeing done and batched (this is when the magic occurs).  You can leave the batched fabric anywhere from two to twenty-four hours in their plastic bags.  I have left them for longer and there was no mildew when the bags were opened just glorious color.

Two days later, when I opened the bags and washed the fabric, I discovered that the color was not as intense as I first imagined, in fact it was quite the opposite.  I was not sure if I liked such soft color as I like my colors bold and bright, but I guess it grew on me and now it reminds me of spun sugar.  I'm thinking cotton candy, in soft pink, blue, green and yellow.

Enjoy!